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Alienware - never again
Purchasing two Alienware systems has been one of the worst computer experiences ever.
Prior to purchasing my top of the line Alienware desktop in July 2010, I had assembled two my prior desktops. The never ending hardware glitches brought me back to pre-assembled systems and as I am into high performance - and wanted reliability - I choose Alienware. Spent right around $5.5k on the machine.
I took the plunge and purchased a top of the line laptop the following January. Another $5.5k for an M-17x.
Come the following June (2011) I had to place my first call to Dell. A tech came out the next day and replaced both video cards. That experience was ok, and I was talked into upgrading the warranties for both machines at ~$600 a pop.
We are on a summer vacation and I am lugging the beast of a laptop around with us. Today I was typing an email and the screen went blank. No warning, just blank. Computer was still running. I shut it down, let it rest and re-booted.Still nothing. Called support and I have to send it in and will be without the computer for 3.5 weeks (due to being on vacation for another 2 weeks and having to use the home address for the ticket basis).
This should not be happening. ~$12k on two computers that have both seen service calls. I am typing this on an ASUS laptop that I purchased 6 years ago and handed down to my son. I spent $1.7k on this and the only thing wrong with it is that the battery doesn't hold a charge any more.
Never buying an Alienware again. Overpriced junk.
AndrewSi
901 Posts
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July 23rd, 2012 21:00
Man have you have had some really really bad luck or what, these machine are usually pretty good, especially the model your talking about (I assume it a M17x R2) the ATI graphics cards are more reliable and less troublesome than nVIDIA in my opinion, but thats about it, is it a M17x R2?
Sounds like the graphics card has blown, can you get any picture when you boot?
I have to say, I'm not sure where you are, but here in Australia the so-called Dell Tech's leave a lot to be desired, I'm sure there are great ones working out there somewhere, it's just that none of my customers or myself have ever met one, I think they are all working somewhere else that pays better as Dell tech's here get bad wages according to my freind who just finished working for them
This could have something to do with you current predicament
roxley1
3 Posts
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July 23rd, 2012 21:00
Yes - it is the M17x R2 - with nVidia.
The screen appears black - but I did notice a change in the screen when I opted for the F2 button for setup when the AC was unplugged. I then hit F1 and the screen changed. I looked close and could just barely make out the high contrast text and background. The room was well lit and for all intents and purposes it appeared black, but there was a very faint display - very, very, very faint.
There was no warning... no screen artifacts, one second I was typing, the next everything was black...
Paperweight...
BradI
7 Posts
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July 24th, 2012 15:00
if you reboot and look at the bios screen is the text at the right intensity or is it dim too?
roxley1
3 Posts
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July 24th, 2012 17:00
Dim... to the point of nothing on the screen. I booted up last night in a very dark room and couldn't see a thing.
Cenobitez
348 Posts
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July 25th, 2012 21:00
Sounds like the Inverter or backlight has blown. If its totally dark with no flickers or colour change it was prob the inverter. With the backlight you normally get a little pink tinge and some flickering before they go.
Its just bad luck with these 2 problems, I've seen it on Sonys, Acer, HP, Tosh, you name it. Personally had it happen to a 5yr old Dell Inspiron, and had it happen to an apple macbook which had max 50 hours use (only kept for testing layouts), so just bad luck :)
TWGAMER666
96 Posts
0
July 26th, 2012 00:00
Roxley1, I thought I had bad luck (well as it happens I really do have a lot of bad luck), but $12,000 on two faulty machines, man that sucks. I really hope you get something sorted out. Once again... unacceptabel. What is going on here?
89fordprobee
1.2K Posts
0
July 26th, 2012 14:00
cost is irrelevent to the defects.. since its the same part thats used on a 1800.00 machine and probably the samepart thats used on a 400.00 acer laptop ...... :O
i paid 41000.00 for my SUV so i guess it should be better and less problems then my 250.00 Neon....... nope.. wrong again .....
everything is so mass produced and quailty control sucks, but how can you test if something is gonna fail 3 months down the road? a year... or 2...... and so on... you cant without actually testing every component for that lenght of time so this is were warranty kicks in... to guarantee, but dell dont seem to like to honour there own policies lately
in your case it sounds more like the backlighting/inverter failed as stated i do beleive these can be picked up decent price off the interwebs . Inverters can be had for like 25.00 US on ebay and so fourth so if no warranty left its an option, to replace yourself.
hopefully everything works out better then it did for me when i had my M17X, sold it in the end i loved the damned thing but the stress was just to much, got a M11X R1 for playing about and a desktop now for what i need it for .